I am on a 64-bit system. I am running KDE 4.8.4. Last night I ran a dist-upgrade and now when I login to KDE plasma desktop shell and kwin keep crashing on me. I get a message screen saying plasma desktop shell has closed unexpectedly. I also get 3-4 message screens saying kwin has closed unexpectedly. Once I close the plasma desktop error another window will appear saying "kwin is unstable. it seems to have crashed several times in a row." At this point it asks me to pick a new window manager but the box is empty. When I close all the error messages nothing happens and I never get a desktop.

When I go to the developer information tab on the error screen the box is empty. I do not have the proper debugger package installed. I am not sure which one I should have installed. Anyone have any ideas which I should install?

What other information is needed to troubleshoot this issue? I can post anything someone might need. One thing I have tried is to rename my .kde folder in my home folder to see if that would help but it has not.

The first logfiles to check would be /var/log/kdm.log and /var/log/Xorg.0.log. Furthermore it would help a lot to know more about the previous known good system state (last successful upgrade), to start pinpointing what might actually break. Given that Debian is mostly in freeze for wheezy, there aren't that fundamental changes happening at the moment, so breakage should be less likely and easier to point out.

As a temporary workaround, it might help to install an alternative desktop environment like XFCE4:

Furthermore it would help a lot to know more about the previous known good system state (last successful upgrade), to start pinpointing what might actually break. Given that Debian is mostly in freeze for wheezy, there aren't that fundamental changes happening at the moment, so breakage should be less likely and easier to point out.

Ok Below is my last two dist-upgrades showing what was done. The dist-upgrade I did on august 12 I did not have any problems that I noticed.

If you need other info let me know. BTW, do you know which debug package I could install to get a back trace?

Thank you.

bmorency

Post subject:Posted: 24.08.2012, 17:17

Joined: 2010-10-22
Posts: 71

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Does anyone have any ideas what could be causing this issue?

Thank you.

oldie

Post subject:Posted: 24.08.2012, 18:58

Joined: 2010-09-12
Posts: 28

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libqt4* , libqt4-script = idea

bmorency

Post subject:Posted: 24.08.2012, 19:25

Joined: 2010-10-22
Posts: 71

Status: Offline

oldie wrote:

libqt4* , libqt4-script = idea

Is there a known bug with those packages?

slh

Post subject:Posted: 26.08.2012, 14:32

Joined: 2010-08-25
Posts: 919

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The bug appears to be influenced by the amount of system RAM available, e.g. it does not manifest itself with ~3 GB of RAM or more, which made this hard to spot. I've uploaded fixed packages to our repo, please test and report.

DeepDayze

Post subject:Posted: 26.08.2012, 16:43

Joined: 2010-09-11
Posts: 616
Location: USA
Status: Offline

I haven't seen this bug as my system has 4GB RAM...I might test it with 2GB by temporarily removing one 2GB stick and see if I get the bug

bmorency

Post subject:Posted: 27.08.2012, 02:36

Joined: 2010-10-22
Posts: 71

Status: Offline

slh wrote:

The bug appears to be influenced by the amount of system RAM available, e.g. it does not manifest itself with ~3 GB of RAM or more, which made this hard to spot. I've uploaded fixed packages to our repo, please test and report.

It seems to be fixed now. I can log into KDE now with no issues. In my system I have only 2 GB of RAM.
Thank you for all the help.